Society in America - Book Series

  Eight U.S. Cities at Mid-Century 
   Those interested in collecting books published in a series, or readers curious about the social history of eight American cities around 75 years ago, will find these publications by E.P. Dutton worth considering.
   I suppose I should have led with the adjectives used to describe the citizens in six of the cities to attract your attention. Here they are and do you think you can match the adjective to a city without looking: "Amiable", "Lusty", "Proper", "Romantic", "Serene", and "Spectacular"? Apparently those living in Memphis and Washington are not so easily characterized.
  The purpose of the publisher was to “to portray the individual characteristics, to underscore the idiosyncrasies, and to trace the growth of sectional societies with special emphasis on local traditions and on the personalities who embodied them.”  You will likely recognize the title of the first book on the list below and will know about the author of it for other reasons.
  You will also probably associate Babe Ruth and Mencken with Baltimore, but not realize it was also the birthplace of Bromo-Seltzer. 
   It is doubtful that you know about Fanny Trollope's bizarre bazaar in Cincinnati in the 1830s, but the book is worth our attention for that reason alone. 
   All of these books are available via Amazon or AbeBooks, but before you buy them, you should know that some are fully available on the Internet Archive. That is true, as well for Fanny's thoughts which are found in "Domestic Manners of the Americans", which is also purchasable as a paperback from Penguin. If you live in London, The Proper Bostonians is in storage up at Western and more books by Amory are found there and are mentioned below.

The Proper Bostonians, Cleveland Amory.
From: "Books" Boston's Closed Corporation," Time, Oct. 20, 1947.
"In The Proper Bostonians, young (30) Cleveland Amory, a Social Registerite himself, has set out to examine his peers. The book is the first of a series which Dutton will publish about U.S. society (others to come: New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Santa Fe). Culled largely from First Family writings and conversations with Beacon Hill contemporaries, Amory’s smoothly phrased findings are not likely to ruffle the poise of the Cabots and the Lowells. Still, many a less proper Bostonian will find much here to delight him."

The Amiable Baltimoreans, Francis F.F. Beirne.

From: The blurb of the JHU Press reissue of the book in 1984. "The first umbrella in America and a Washington monument that predates the one in the nation's capital were raised in Baltimore. A renowned beauty of the city, Betsy Patterson, married Jerome Bonaparte, but was forbidden by her brother-in-law, Napoleon, from ever setting foot in France. A century later, Wallis Warfield, another Baltimorean, made her own assault on European royalty. Baltimore is the city of Babe Ruth and H.L. Mencken and the final resting-place of Edgar Allan Poe. "The gastronomic metropolis of the Union," according to Oliver Wendell Holmes, it is also the home of Bromo-Seltzer.

First published in 1951, The Amiable Baltimoreans presents 250 years of anecdotal history about the city—its buildings, its institutions, its customs, and most of all, its people. Informative, amusing, and sometimes discomforting, it offers an incomparable look into the city's past and revealing insight into the way it seemed to one informed observer thirty years ago."

The Serene Cincinnatians, Alvin F. Harlow. From: "Book Captures Cincinnati's Quirks at an Interesting Time for the City: Our History," Jeff Suess, The Enquirer, Jan. 22, 2023.
"The publication of the history book "The Serene Cincinnatians" by Alvin F. Harlow in October 1950 was the talk of the town. Shillito's department store and John G. Kidd & Son booksellers advertised to preorder copies for $4.50 in the local newspapers. A display of the book at the Cincinnati Public Library – that's the Old Main Library at 629 Vine St. – filled six street windows and several cases in the lobby. The Enquirer and the Cincinnati Post ran articles on the book's release, as well as reviews and commentary on the response. That's a lot of coverage for a history book....

The New York-based author spent months visiting local libraries, historical societies and The Enquirer, as well as hours in conversation with old-timers who filled his notebook with intimate knowledge and anecdotes. Cincinnati had a reputation for being old-fashioned. Harlow opened the book with the city's indignation over the then-recent coverage of the opening of the Terrace Plaza Hotel in 1948. The milestone modernist hotel was revolutionary for its time, yet Time magazine began its story: "Dowdy, old-fashioned Cincinnati gets a new hotel this week." Cincinnati was a place where you could still find chimney sweeps in 1950, a city that basked in its traditions, Harlow wrote. Yet, it also was a city of firsts – the first airmail by balloon, the first professional fire department, the first and only railroad to be owned by a municipality, the Cincinnati Southern Railway....

What sets Harlow's work apart were those gossipy anecdotes that reveal Cincinnatians may not have always been serene, but they were real people....

Details you won't find in other books. One highlight was Harlow's description of Frances Trollope's infamous bazaar. The Englishwoman had come to Cincinnati in 1828, drawn by the young city's reputation for culture, and hoped to make her fortune with her unique marketplace on Third Street near Broadway. There is continued fascination with this curiosity. Harlow called Trollope's Bazaar "a weird creation, predominantly Moorish-Arabesque, as one critic described it, with touches of Gothic and God-knows-what. "In its semi-basement was an elegant coffee-house and bar, the floor above was the store, with an ice cream and oyster parlor, also elegant, back of it, while the whole top floor was a ballroom ... "In the store, she stocked jewelry, pictures, laces, bric-a-brac and articles of virtu (rare objects), which she bought mostly at retail prices and marked up, naively supposing that in so colorful a setting and from a cultured Englishwoman, the dazzled bourgeoisie would buy at any price. But they did not." After the failure of the bazaar, Trollope returned to England and wrote a scathing account of her time here in "Domestic Manners of the Americans" (1832). Harlow spent several pages throughout the book countering many of Trollope's criticisms, thus "The Serene Cincinnatians" serves as something of a rebuttal some 118 years later."

Memphis Down in Dixie, Shields Mcilwaine. From: “Memphis, Tenn., Past and Present,” Turner Catledge, New York Times, June 6, 1948. “Mr. Mcilwaine struck it rich for both his regional thesis (that the way to understand America is region by region) and his story-telling ability when he dug into the past and present of Memphis, Tennessee. For Memphis is such a mine of anecdote, romance and important history that one can pick and choose as he pleases, and then organize his total story in a manner to prove almost anything, or simply to be entertaining.”

The Romantic New Orleanians, Robert Tallant. From: Kirkus Reviews, Jan. 1, 1949: "Fifth in the series launched by the tremendously successful The Proper Bostonians- and as predictably good as one knew a New Orleans' book by Robert Tallant would be. With the wealth of first rate writing that has been done about that provocatively fascinating city, it is astonishing that he has found so much new to be said- and, for the greater part, succeeded in making it interesting even to the outsider. For actually it is virtually a Burke's Peerage translated into terms of New Orleans' inner circle. The Creole aristocracy, unlike that of any other place, depended not a whit on worldly goods- and despite the relatively small number of Creoles in a preponderantly American city, the French, and to a lesser extent the Spanish flavor, the mores and traditions of the old Creole conservative society, the attitude towards women, the pace of living- all are still permeated by that tiny element. New Orleans and her people are portrayed in profiles of personalities of the past; in flavorsome bits about the balls, the carnivals, the snobbery, the clubs, in genealogy spiced with gossip; in colorful passages of the city's history; in the growth away from- and back to- the French Quarter."

The Spectacular San Franciscans, Julia Cooley Altrocchi.

For a lukewarm review see: "West Coast City; THE SPECTACULAR SAN FRANCISCANS. By Julia Cooley Altrocchi. Society in American Series. 398 pp. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co. $4.50, by Jack Foisie, New York Times, July 24, 1949.

The Lusty Texans of Dallas, John William Rogers. From Kirkus Reviews, Jan. 1, 1950 "Seventh in the Society in America Series, this more than flatteringly pictures the growth of a cluster of cabins on a river bank into a modern metropolis -- a progress which has not smothered either the individuality or the initiative of the city or its citizens. It is a story that encompasses all aspects of this development -- geographical, economic, social and fashionable, cultural, religious, educational and informative. It highlights the heritage of the far past, takes the story from the arrival of John Neely Bryan and his one man community which was incorporated in 1856 as Dallas, and carries on its history as a frontier town that grew up by not following the pattern of other southwest towns. From the conventions and customs of the early days on to those of today, with the folklore and legend given full play, this emphasizes the isolation that brought independence, the particular climate and tradition of life that effected the people who have lived, and who still live, there. A pretty insistent volume, this." See also: “Texas Culture,” Washington Post, Mar. 25, 1951 and “Deep in the Mind of Texas,” Hoffman Birney, New York Times, Jan.21, 1951

Washington Cavalcade, Charles Hurd. From: “Hurd Tackles a Tough One in This City: Washington Cavalcade,” Sterling North, Washington Post, Jan. 18, 1948 “Hurd has written a gay, shallow, non-stop gossip column dealing with costumes, customs and eccentricities which might have been subtitled: ‘From Dolly Madison to Dolly Gann – A Tempest in a Teapot."

Post Script:

In 1952 Dutton celebrated its 100th birthday. They also published, with J.M.Dent & Sons of London, the Everyman's Library. The New York Times contains this article which provides these interesting tidbits: "The record best-seller of the company was the controversial "Under Cover," written before World War II by an author who signed the name John Roy Carlson. It sold 650,000 copies in ten months. Next on the Dutton best-seller list have been the books of A. A. Milne. "When We Were Very Young," "Winnie-the-Pooh," "Now We Are Six" and "The House at Pooh Corner," published in that order, have sold altogether 1,500,000 copies. In 1850 a book selling 3,000 copies at 75 cents to $1 was a best seller. The sales requirement has risen to about 50,000 today, Mr. Macrae estimated, and the price has risen to $3 to $6. As long as the public refuses to buy worthy books in large numbers, he added, the price will have to stay up. The best seller must help pay for the worthy, poor-selling book." "E.P. Dutton Marks Its 100th Birthday..." Jan. 4, 1952.

The Bonus: Even if you were born in this century, you may have recognized the name 'Cleveland Amory' and he may be more interesting to you than the books mentioned above. He wrote others, including The Last Resorts, which includes a chapter on "Palm Beach" - a popular place right now and known as a sunny place for shady people. You may have heard of him in relation to animal rights and more about his involvement is easily found. He appears on YouTube and here is an example: Man Kind? "In 1974 the US Fish and Wildlife Service produced a 26 minute documentary short featuring an interesting interview with the great writer, critic and animal advocate, Cleveland Amory, who has just completed a book entitled "Man KInd?" about how badly wildlife is treated. Amory started The Fund for Animals." Source:

For more details about the "Society in America" book series see:

Series Americana: Post Depression-Era Regional Literature, 1938-1980: A Descriptive Bibliography: Including Biographies of the Authors, Illustrators, and Editors, by Carol Fitzgerald.

Beyond the Palewall (5)

 

[Beyond the palewall is the title of this series because beyond the paywall is taken. Information for which you are not willing to pay, along with information you may not wish to know, is presented in abbreviated form without charge. What has caught my eye may sometimes feel like a poke in yours and, in that sense, be beyond the pale. Items will appear weekly, or perhaps monthly, or maybe semi-annually, if I can get started and the weather is bleak.]

Something Else to Worry About

   One would think that it would be good news that fish are able to survive in Hamilton Harbour, but that is not the case. Very large goldfish have been spotted there and elsewhere in the Great Lakes (and elsewhere around the globe.) The point to be made in this post is simply that you should not take your goldfish out of the bowl and put it in the Thames.

   "Over the past several years, Ms. Boston and her colleagues have been tracking invasive goldfish in Hamilton Harbour, which is on the western tip of Lake Ontario, about 35 miles southwest of Toronto. The bay has been decimated by industrial and urban development as well as by invasive species — making it among the most environmentally degraded areas of the Great Lakes.

Their study, published last month in the Journal of Great Lakes Research, could help pinpoint goldfish populations for culling, said Ms. Boston, who is the lead author. “We found out where they are before they start spawning,” she said. “That’s a good opportunity to get rid of them.”

   The fast-growing female goldfish, Ms. Boston noted, can also reproduce several times in one season. “They have the resources,” she added, “and they can take advantage of them.”

   Goldfish were first spotted in Hamilton Harbour in the 1960s, but largely died off in the 1970s because of industrial contamination. In the early 2000s, their population appeared to recover. Goldfish can tolerate a wide range of water temperatures, reach sexual maturation quickly, and can eat nearly anything, including algae, aquatic plants, eggs and invertebrates, Ms. Boston said.

   Their football-shaped bodies can swell to a size that makes them too large a meal for predators — up to about 16 inches long. “A fish would have to have a really big mouth to eat it,” she said....

   Nicholas Mandrak, a professor of biological sciences at the University of Toronto Scarborough, said that while goldfish were introduced to North America in the late 1800s, the wild population had begun to “dramatically increase” in the past two decades. Their spawning explosion, he said, resulted partly from people in densely-populated areas releasing pets in urban ponds.

   Climate change may play a role, because of the goldfish’s capacity to adapt to warming and poorly oxygenated waters, he added.

   “There are literally millions of goldfish in the Great Lakes, if not tens of millions,” Dr. Mandrak said.

Sources:

 "Once They Were Pets. Now Giant Goldfish Are Menacing the Great Lakes.

Released into the Wild, the Humble Goldfish Can Grow to a Monstrous Size and Destroy Habitats for Native Species. Canadian Researchers are Tracking the Fish, so That They Might be Culled," Livia Albeck-Ripka, New York Times, Dec. 8, 2023.

  That the problem is a global one is clear from the picture, which portrays a goldfish caught in Europe. "Behold Carrot, The 67-pound Goldfish Caught in France," Jennifer Hassan, The Washington Post, Nov. 22, 2022.

 

Magazines Are Disappearing Along With Newspapers

   In Mulcahy's Miscellany there is a series titled "Periodical Ramblings" and the last post in it was about, Liberty magazine which stopped publishing in Canada long ago. The Last Post has now been sounded for Readers Digest Canada which has been around over 75 years. Although one commentator called it the "Barry Manilow of magazines," another noted: “It’s going to be missed by a lot of readers,” said Mark Pupo, who was editor-in-chief of Reader’s Digest Canada from 2019-2022. “It was a great space for Canadian storytelling. We’re losing a lot.” The following brief bits are from: "Reader's Digest Canada, Once A Household Staple, Will End its Run After 76 Years," Jana G. Pruden, Globe and Mail, Dec. 5, 2023.

   Employees were told Reader’s Digest Magazines Ltd. will continue to publish its five Canadian magazines until March 31, 2024, and that the websites will remain in operation “for a certain period” with “basic support” from employees in the United States.

   A spokesperson from American parent company Trusted Media Brands – identified in the presentation to staff as the person to handle all media inquiries – did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

It was an unceremonious announcement for a digest that has been a venerable part of the Canadian magazine market since it began publishing in the country in 1947. It was declared the most influential magazine in Canadian publishing history in 2008.

   As recently as April, a press release described Reader’s Digest as Canada’s most-read monthly magazine, boasting more than three million readers every month. Reader’s Digest Magazines Ltd. also publishes a French edition, Sélection, as well as Best Health Canada, Our Canada and More Our Canada....

   Founded in the U.S. in 1922, Reader’s Digest grew to be a dominant global brand with dozens of editions published all over the world in multiple languages, including braille, and sold in over 60 countries.

The magazine became known for its mix of upbeat and informative stories, health and wellness news and dramatic storytelling, often condensed and updated versions of other magazine pieces. Issues were also peppered with vocabulary quizzes, facts, jokes, comics, puzzles and lighthearted anecdotes in features such as Laughter, the Best Medicine, and Life’s Like That.

Post Script: 

   It is worth noting that the owner of the magazine is Trusted Media Brands. 

   Unfortunately, those of you who are saddened by this loss will no longer be able to reach for a Kleenex. See: "What Kleenex's Canadian Exit Reveals About Our  Grocery Sector's Lack of Competition," David Soberman, Globe and Mail, Sept. 11, 2023.

City Living

   I am not a big fan of big cities, nor do I put much faith in rankings. I did, however, call your attention to "The 100 Most Livable Cities in Canada", and particularly to the fact that London does not appear in that ranking. Another one has just been completed and London does not show up in it either. Ranked, this time, is the "Quality of Living", which must be related, one would think, to being "Livable." Given that I have provided you with the Globe and Mail and Economist rankings, I will now point you to the one by Mercer: "Quality of Living City Ranking 2023." You can go through the rankings by clicking on that link. If you don't want to take the time, I will suggest that you move to Vancouver if you wish to stay in this country or Vienna if you want to live abroad. 

Sources:

  "Vancouver Beats Out Toronto For Cities With the Best Quality of Living For Expats," The Toronto Star, Dec. 14, 2023

  Five Canadian cities made it on to the list ranking quality of life for newcomers and expatriates, but only one made it into the top ten.

   Vancouver - at eighth - beat out Toronto (17th), Ottawa (tied for 18th), Montreal (tied for 20th) and Calgary (tied for 23rd).

   "Move to One of These 10 Global Cities in 2024 If You Want to Work Somewhere    With a Great Quality of Life," Michael Grothaus, Fast Company, Dec. 15, 2023.

   "If you’ve ever wondered which of the world’s cities might be the best to live and work in, you’ll want to check out Mercer’s 2023 Quality of Living rankings, which look at the quality of life that workers and their families who work outside their home countries have.  

   This year, the consulting firm ranked more than 200 cities on five continents. The top city in the world, according to Mercer’s rankings, is Vienna, Austria. Mercer says the central European capital is “known for its rich history, stunning architecture, and vibrant cultural scene, Vienna offers its residents a high standard of living in various aspects.”

   The remainder of the top 10 list is dominated by European cities, which take seven of the 10 spots. Germany alone takes three of the top 10 spots with Frankfurt in 6th place, Munich in 7th, and Dusseldorf in 10th. The only North American city to make the top 10 list is Vancouver, Canada, which came in 8th place."